Action Figures I Like: AzBats & Bane

Today's figures are from the Knightfall storyline back in the early 90s.  That was where the evil Bane comes to Gotham, lets out most of Batman's enemies from Arkham, and then breaks Bruce Wayne's back.  Bruce then chooses Jean-Paul Valley, the former assassin Azrael to replace him.  Because he was Azrael and Batman, fans mash it together into AzBats.

The first AzBats I ever bought is the little one on the right in the picture.  That's the first suit Jean-Paul Valley makes.  The figure was part of the "Legends of Batman" series back in the mid-90s that was sold in a two-pack with Viking Batman--you know, Batman dressed like a Viking.

In 2013 the DC Multiverse line came out with a new AzBats figure, one that is based on the final suit Jean-Paul makes.  I pre-ordered the figure from Amazon because I was really hot to get it.  And I wasn't disappointed.  It is pretty sweet, with a good amount of detail for the time, including the bandoliers of darts or Batarangs or whatever they were supposed to be. 

The one problem as you can see in this old picture is that he doesn't stand very well.  He's really top-heavy, so that I usually had to bend his knees to get him to balance.  I wound up putting him on a cardboard stand with the older Azrael figure I bought a little later.

The AzBats figure came with a Build-A-Figure piece for Bane.  It was unfortunately a leg, not the head.  The head I bought later off eBay.  The weird thing is that the rest of the parts to make that Bane were more expensive than buying the 90s "Legends of the Dark Knight" figure.  The head of that figure looked really stupid with long brown hair sticking out.  

So I sawed the head off that figure and glued on the head from the AzBats series Build-A-Figure I got from eBay.  And while he isn't 100% accurate to the comics with the blue jeans, he's close enough.  Plus it's always neater when you make it yourself.  I mean no one else in the world has a Bane like that.  Just me.  So there.